NEW DELHI — India will make coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) molecular tests mandatory for people arriving directly or indirectly from the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil to contain the spread of more infectious virus variants found in those countries.

India, which has reported the highest number of overall COVID-19 cases after the United States, detected the South African variant in four people last month and the Brazilian one in one person this month.

The government has said the South African and Brazilian strains can more easily infect a person’s lungs than the UK mutation. India has reported 187 cases of infection with the UK variant.

The government late on Wednesday said airlines would be required from next week to segregate inbound travelers from those countries. India does not have direct flights with Brazil and South Africa, and most people traveling from these countries generally transit through Middle Eastern airports.

“All the travelers arriving from/transiting through flights originating from the United Kingdom, Europe or the Middle East shall be mandatorily subjected to self-paid confirmatory molecular tests on arrival,” India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said in a statement.

All flyers will also have to carry a recent COVID-negative report before boarding any flight to India, except in extraordinary circumstances like death in a family.

India has reported about 11 million coronavirus cases and more than 155,000 deaths. Cases have come down sharply since a mid-September peak of nearly 100,000 a day.

But a government serological survey released this month showed that nearly 300 million of India’s 1.35 billion people might already have been infected by the virus.

The country has also given 9.2 million vaccine doses since starting its campaign on Jan. 16. — Reuters

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